See you in Florence, Italy, at the 19th ICO Congress, August 25-31, 2002

The nineteenth Congress of ICO will meet in Florence, Italy, August 25-31, 2002. It will consist of a scientific meeting and of the business part, known as the ICO General Meeting. The scientific meeting is expected to be the largest ICO event ever and will, as usual, cover all of optics, providing an outstanding opportunity to review progress and challenges of our discipline. Over 30 world class invited speakers will present an overview of their field, and the recipients of the recent ICO Prizes and ICO Galileo Galilei awards will present their award lectures. Postdeadline submissions will be accepted until July 1st. Early registration deadline is July 15 and it is advisable to book accommodation by the same time. Practical information, together with the advance programme, are found on http://ico19.fi.cnr.it/

Delegates from all ICO members will meet twice during ICO XVIII and review ICO activities and policies, admit new members and elect the new Bureau that will hold office for the next triennium. At every ICO General Meeting, the General Assembly elects the President, Secretary, Treasurer and Vice-Presidents for a three-year term. The chairperson of the Nominating Committee, Professor Toshimitsu Asakura, has written to the Territorial Committees and requested nominations and endorsements for all positions. Of course, representation on the ICO Bureau is open to all Members and it is hoped that a fair geographical distribution, as well as a good balance with regard to professional activity will be reached. The election procedure is detailed in the ICO Statutes and in the ICO Rules and Codes of Practice, both of which can be found on this web site, or can be obtained from the ICO Secretariat.

ICO/ICTP Award 2002 to be presented to Alphan Sennaroglu

At an ICO-hosted party during the Winter College, the third ICO/ICTP Prize was announced. The award is intented for scientists less than 40 years old who are active in research in optics and have significantly contributed to the promotion of research activities in Optics in their own or another developing country. The call for nominations for the 2003 award is included in this Newsletter. The winner for 2002 is Prof. Alphan Sennaroglu of the Laser Research Laboratory, Dept of Physics, Koc University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Alphan Sennaroglu received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University in 1988, 1990, and 1994, respectively. In 1997, he obtained the "Doçent" degree from the Higher Education Council of Turkey.

In 1994, he joined Koç University in Istanbul, Turkey, where he is currently an Associate Professor of Physics and Electrical Engineering. His research focuses on the development of solid-state lasers, spectroscopic investigation of new laser media, experimental and theoretical study of thermal effects, ultrashort pulse generation, and nonlinear optics. He has published more than 50 journal and conference papers in these fields. His recent work involved power optimization studies in room-temperature Cr4+-doped solid-state lasers, picosecond pulse generation from Cr2+:ZnSe lasers, and broadly tunable orange-red light generation by using frequency-doubled Cr4+:forsterite lasers. He established the Laser Research Laboratory and the Experimental Physics teaching laboratory at Koç University. In 1999, he founded the Turkey Chapter of IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Lasers and Electro-Optics Society and currently serves as the Chapter president.

Alphan Sennaroglu is a member of the Optics Committee of Turkey, IEEE, the Optical Society of America, Tau Beta Pi, and Eta Kappa Nu. He received the Werner-von-Siemens Excellence Award (Koç University, 2001), Tuba (Turkish Academy of Sciences) Distinguished Young Scientist Award (2001), Tubitak (the Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey) Young Scientist Award (1998), Sage Graduate Fellowship (Cornell University, 1989-1990), Sibley Prize of Electrical Engineering (Cornell University, 1988), and the Amideast undergraduate scholarship (1984-1988).

The award will be formally presented at the next appropriate ICO/ICTP/OSA Winter College on Optics.

ICO/ICTP Award 2003: call for nominations

ICO, the International Commission for Optics, has established three awards: the « ICO Prize », the ICO Galileo Galilei Award and the ICTP/ICO Award. The latter was established jointly with ICTP, the International Commission for Theoretical Physics. The deadline for the ICTP/ICO Award is November 10, 2002. Call for nominations for the other two awards will be published in the October 2002 issue of this newsletter with a deadline of March 15.

ICO, the International Commission for Optics, and ICTP, the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, have agreed to establish a joint prize, called the ICO/ICTP Award. It is reserved for young researchers from developing countries (as defined by the United Nations), who conduct their research in a developing country. The award will be given to scientists less than 40 years old (on December 31 of the year for which the award is given), who are active in research in Optics and have contributed to the promotion of research activities in Optics in their own or another developing country. While this web site has complete information, the following should be appropriate to prepare a nomination.

The award consists of the following :

the ICO gives a cash amount of US$1000 and a diploma.

The ICTP invites the winner to attend a three weeks College at Trieste at the next appropriate opportunity, and to give a seminar on his/her work when appropriate. ICTP will pay for travel and living expenses. In February 2003, ICTP might to host an ICTP/ICO/OSA Winter College in Biophotonics.

The award will be delivered to the winner at Trieste in the presence of representatives of ICO and ICTP. The award is given to one person every year. The winner is selected on the basis of nominations received by the Award Committee in response to a call published by both ICO and ICTP. The nominations must be documented by a complete curriculum vitae including a list of publications and selected reprints (no more than three) as well as a complete employment history and a description of the nominee's achievements for the promotion of research activity in developing countries.

Full name of nominee Nominator's name and address Nominator's signature, date Date of birth of nominee Business address Academic background, education (college or university, location, major field, degree, year awarded) Academic honors Employment history (position, organization, duties,dates) Publications, patents, unpublished reports, papers presented at meetings, etc. (attach a list of those you deem pertinent) Honors and awards. Scientific achievements for which the candidate is nominated for this award : attach a separate sheet).

Nominators are encouraged to generate supporting letters. Each supporting letter must come from a different country or ICO Territory and bring an additional information on the case. The number of supporting letters will not be a selection criterion.

The recipient will be expected to give a presentation based upon his/her achievements at the next appropriate ICTP/ICO event.

ETOP VII meeting report: Education and Training in Optics and Photonics for the 21st Century, Building a Global Network for International Cooperation

The conference on Education and Training in Optics and Photonics (ETOP) is a biennial international conference dedicated to optics and photonics education and training. Since its inception in 1988 in San Diego, California, USA, the conference has subsequently been held in Leningrad, USSR (1991); Pecs, Hungary (1993); San Diego, USA (1995); Delft, the Netherlands (1997); and Cancun, Mexico (1999). ETOP 2001, the 7th conference in this series, was held on 26-30 November 2001 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore, since it is anticipated that the optics and photonics community and industry in Singapore and the Southeast Asian region will be growing rapidly in the coming years.

The proceedings contain the manuscripts of the 72 papers presented at the conference, the summaries of the Roundtable Discussions on "Global Networking for Local Technician Education: Problems and Solutions", and synopses of the workshop on "Alternative Teaching and Training Methods in Photonics" and the two short courses on Fiber Optics and Tissue Optics.

This conference was characterized by its truly international participations. First, the Program Committee consisted of members from Africa, Asia, Australia, Canada, Central and South America, Europe, Russia, and the USA. For the first time, there were more committee members from Asia, as compared to those from the USA and Europe. This strong Asian representation was also reflected in the number of participants (27) and papers (23) presented at the conference. Participations from the Southeast Asian countries, including Singapore, Malaysia, the Philipines, Thailand, and Indonesia were equally impressive, with a total of 18 participants and 17 papers. Among all the countries, Singapore was at the top, with 12 participants and 12 papers. In comparison, the number of participants from North America (including Canada and USA), Europe, and Australia were, respectively, 21, 13, 7, and 4; and the corresponding number of papers presented were 24, 11, 7, and 7.

Another characteristic of ETOP 2001 was its wide representation from educators at all levels as well as the high visibility from industry and professional societies. For the first time, this conference brought together educators from around the world to share their vision, methodology, and experience relevant to the education of students from primary and high schools, to community colleges and universities. In particular, recent developments in the formation of photonics learning and research centers at the premier secondary schools in Singapore, namely, The Chinese High School and the Raffles Institution, were reported, generating much attention from the participants.

A main focus of the conference was technician education and training . In addition to the various programs reported by different institutions, a Roundtable Discussion session was held following the presentation of technical papers, with the theme "Global Networking for Local Technician Education: Problems and Solutions." A panel of 13 members from different countries led the discussions that involved more than 30 participants. An outstanding achievement of this session was the enthusiasm and consensus among all participants that a global network must be formed to enable the exchange of information and sharing of resources in this critical area. Reports on future activities will be distribute through appropriate channels and all people who are willing to contribute their ideas and efforts are welcome to join this network.

Cooperative programs developed in Australia, Canada, China, the European countries, Singapore, and the USA were also reported. The success of these programs is attributed to the collaboration of academia, government, the industry, and professional societies at the regional, national, and international levels. In particular, the formation of optics clusters around the world in recent years has led to the initiatives for the development of integrated education and training programs for the sustainable growth of the optics and photonics enterprise. Indeed, this conference has achieved its goal of providing a timely platform for building a global network for international cooperation on education and training in optics and photonics for the 21st century. In this context, the papers published here will definitely serve as an important source of reference for many years to come.

Finally, we would like to take this opportunity to thank the sponsoring and cooperating organizations for their contribution to the success of this conference, and the dedication of all members of the Program Committee and the Local Organizing Committee, as well as the Conference Secretariat, Notchez International Pte. Ltd., Singapore, in making this conference a great success.

The 3rd International Conference on Optics-photonics Design & Fabrication "ODF 2002, Tokyo" will be held from October 30 - November 1, 2002 in Tokyo, Japan. Optics-photonics design and fabrication will continue to play an ever increasing role in the 21st century in harmony with technology and environment. ODF2002 is intended to provide an international forum for original paper presentations and discussions of optics-photonics design and fabrication related technological and scientific topics. These topics include theory, design, fabrication, testing, applications and others. The conference site has been chosen to National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo as the best site for such discussions. ODF2002 is aimed to be an excellent opportunity to exchange ideas and achievements to promote international collaboration among participants for the future directions in this field including related companies' exhibition.

Invited speakers will include Prof. M. C. Wu (UCLA/USA). While the submission deadline is already past, postdeadline submission information will be announced in the advance program. Preregistration deadline is September 30. Please visit ODF 2002 and join us!

Web links on standards in Optics

The International Commission for Optics has always been keen to help promoting interaction and information on Optics Standards. The readers of the Newsletter may therefore be interested in the following list of relevant websites: